


light carries on endlessly

by middnighter



Category: Booster Gold (Comics), Green Lantern Corps (Comics), Justice League International (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Fluff without Plot, M/M, Major Character Undeath, Ted Kord Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-20
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2019-03-21 20:46:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,367
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13748937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/middnighter/pseuds/middnighter
Summary: Soulmates were already a complicated business. So imagine having three of them.





	light carries on endlessly

**Author's Note:**

> open your third eye and accept the polyship in your heart

Soulmates were a complicated business.

Some people had words on their wrist, over their heart, behind their necks. Sometimes the name of their soulmate, sometimes some kind of clue on how to find them.

Some people had a timer on their arm, counting down the moment when they would meet their soulmate. Or the moment when they would lose them.

Some people had the first thing their soulmate said to them tattooed somewhere on their body. Some other people had the last.

Some people shared a bond with their soulmate, and could communicate feelings, emotions, sometimes even thoughts.

Booster had a piece of red thread hanging from his pinkie finger.

He couldn’t touch it or feel it, only see it stretch away. He tried to follow it once, but it was tangled with other threads, and he couldn’t make sense of where his own was heading.

Ted also had a thread. He told Booster about it one night, about how it split up in three different directions, and he didn’t want to have to pick one of them. About how he thought that one day it would sort itself out, he didn’t need to rush it.

Ted didn’t get the chance figure it out before his death. And Booster’s thread stopped stretching away, and was now only a few inches long, hanging from his finger, like someone had cut it with a pair of scissors. Which made sense. It didn’t have anywhere to go anymore.

Booster wished he could have found out about it earlier.

* * *

_He wakes up in a field of flowers. The sky is pink, and that doesn’t shock him. It feels right, it feels peaceful._

_He lays down. He looks at the stars. The summer wind blows on his face._

_And then there is someone laying down next to him._

_“It’s been a while,” the person says._

_“I’m sorry,” Booster says. “I’ve been having a hard time sleeping lately.”_

_“Yeah, me too.”_

_Booster rolls over and props himself up on his elbows. He looks at the blurred features of the man next to him. He can only make out the ginger hair and the green jacket before his eyes drift back to the sky. Looking at the man feels like trying to stare at the sun._

_“I miss him,” Booster says._

_“So do I,” Guy answers._

_They lay next to each other for what feels like hours. They don’t talk. Talking requires a lot of focus here, and they’re happy staring at the sky together._

_“We should do this together someday,” Guy says eventually, “looking at the stars. On the outside, I mean.”_

_“Why?” Booster asks. “They’re always more beautiful here.”_

_“Yeah, but it’s not the real deal.”_

_“Maybe. But it’s not like we’re going to remember to do it anyway. We never do.”_

_“I wish we did.”_

When Booster woke up, he couldn’t remember what he dreamt about. A feeling of melancholy lingered in his chest.

* * *

 The team disbanded, and Booster decided to stick around with Guy for a while.

Outside of the superheroing thing, they would watch football games and go for a drink afterwards. They moved in together in a tiny flat upstairs of Warriors, the bar Guy was running, because it was convenient, and because they enjoyed the other’s company more than they would admit. That thing between them, it worked, in ways neither of them expected it to.

Guy had a short thread hanging from his finger, just like Booster.

“Do you know who was on the other end?” Booster asked, even if he didn’t really need to.

“Yes.” A pause. “It was Ted.”

And somehow that made sense. They always had _something_ , even if they didn’t allow it to be shown properly.

“But that’s not the only thing that tipped me off,” Guy continued.

“Really?”

“Yeah.” Guy removed his right glove and rolled up his sleeve. On his arm was an impressingly big bruise, purple with hints of yellow.

“Where did you get that?” Booster said, leaning closer and squinting. He ran his fingers over it, trying not to notice how Guy shivered under his touch. “That’s funny, I have a bruise on my arm that looks exactly like that.”

“I know.”

Booster raised his eyebrows at him. “How?”

“It’s yours, from that bar fight we got in. That dude who came at you with an empty bottle? Who hit you in the arm? That’s where you got hurt. And the next morning, I woke up with this.”

Guy gestured at his arm. “Ever since I met you, I started getting these bruises at some places where I didn’t actually get hurt. Took me a while to figure it out, that I’d get them every time you got injured.” He paused. “And every time Ted got injured.”

Booster said nothing, just stared at Guy’s arm. He bared his own to compare, and the bruises looked exactly the same.

Guy let out a nervous chuckle. “That’s pretty shitty for a soulmate bond, if you ask me.”

“Shit, Guy… If I had known, I’d have been more careful.”

“Don’t worry about it, it’s like a tattoo. It doesn’t actually damage my body. I still feel the pain, though, but I’m used to it.”

“Did it hurt?” Booster asked, because he needed to know. “When Ted— when he—”

“Yes,” Guy breathed out. “But only for a second. Then it was over.”

Booster nodded and swallowed. “I miss him,” he said, and he felt like he had already said that a million times.

“So do I,” Guy answered, as he did every time Booster said that.

Guy took Booster in his arms, because they both needed it. Because they both wanted it. And even if a piece of them was missing, that didn’t mean they couldn’t find each other.

* * *

  _He wakes up in the field again, and he can hear people talking._

_He rubs his eyes, gets up, and walks until he gets to where the voices come from._

_There’s Guy —Booster was getting better and better at recognizing him— and there is someone else. Booster’s chest is heavy, because the last time they were three, Ted was still alive. And the man sitting next to Guy is definitely not Ted._

_“Hello,” Booster says._

_“Hi,” the man says, waving at him. “You must be Booster. Guy’s been telling me about you.”_

_The man says his name, but Booster doesn’t understand it, just like he can’t tell what the man actually looks like, other than the darkness of his hair. “Nice to meet you,” he nods anyway, because it is the polite thing to do._

_This time around, the sky is green._

* * *

 “I think there is someone else,” Guy said one morning, his head resting on Booster’s chest. It was a quiet morning. No one was trying to take over the world, and they could just relax in their bed and enjoy the warmth of the covers.

“What makes you say that?” Booster asked, softly running his fingers through Guy’s hair.

“Paper cuts have been showing up on my hands, and I’m pretty sure they’re not from you. Have you noticed anything?”

“Not really,” Booster frowned.

He stared at his own hands. There was definitely no paper cuts, but he did find something out of place.

Ink stains were appearing on the tip of his fingers. A quick glance at Guy’s hands, and he saw the same stains in them.

“That’s weird,” Booster said, as he showed the stains to Guy.

Guy groaned and nested his head back in Booster’s neck. “We’ll think about it later, alright? It’s too nice of a morning for this shit.”

Booster let out a quiet laugh, wrapped his arms around Guy’s back and closed his eyes.

* * *

 It took them an embarrassing amount of time to realize that the other person was Kyle.

In the meantime, they got used to having stains of paint, of markers, sometimes of charcoal, that they couldn’t wash off. Sometimes, they even had doodles and scribbled notes appearing on the back of their hands.

Kyle also had a thread cut short hanging from his finger, but they didn’t think much of it. Kyle had lost a lot of people.

When Guy got to be a Green Lantern again, and Kyle was assigned to be his partner, they all decided to move to Oa. Booster didn’t have to have a base of operations, since his new job involved travelling through time, so it wasn’t an issue for him to live off-world. And he figured that the change of scenery would do them good.

Booster could see how hard Guy was falling for Kyle. He could perfectly well understand that. What wasn’t to love about Kyle? He was nice and selfless in a way people who had been through the same things as he had weren’t anymore, and he was extremely talented as an artist with none of the arrogance, and he had a great sense of humor that matched really well with theirs, and he had the most charming smile —and maybe Booster was falling for him too.

Booster and Guy talked about it, and they decided to wait for Kyle to make the first move. Kyle wore his emotions on his sleeve, if they were something he wanted, they’d be able to tell.

And they weren't wrong.

Later, the night after all three of them figured out that whenever Kyle got injured it hurt Guy too, that whatever Kyle drew on his skin showed up on Booster and Guy, words appeared on the back of their hands.

_I love you._

_Both of you._

And that was about the best thing both of them had woken up to.

* * *

  _“Tell me about Ted again,” Kyle asks._

_It’s one of their favorite things to talk about. Booster and Guy take turns telling him anecdotes about him, about a good prank they pulled together, about all the times when one of them saved the other._

_About how they realized too late that they loved him._

_It isn’t anything they haven’t already told Kyle in the real world, but everything feels different here. Simpler._

_In the clear blue sky, touches of orange start showing up between the stars._

* * *

 Their new, bigger bed fit them more comfortably. Their old king size was fine, sure, but three people sleeping needed more room than two. They also got a bigger blanket, and more pillows.

And one day, the threads got back to their original, infinite length, stretching all the way through space, in one specific direction.

Earth.

And as they flew back home as fast as they were able to, they couldn’t prevent the hope from fluttering in their chests, because it could only mean one thing, right?

Ted was back.

 _Hang in there_ , Kyle wrote on his arm. It showed up on Booster’s and Kyle’s arms, and if their theory was true, it would also show up on Ted’s.

They followed the threads until they all merged into one, which led them to the cemetery where Ted was buried.

His grave was dug up, and Ted was sitting next to the hole, with dirt on his face and in his hair. His sleeves rolled up, his skin decorated with Kyle’s handwriting. Alive.

“Took you long enough,” Ted said as he saw them arrive.

Booster ran to him, and took him in his arms, lifting him up and spinning him around.

“Ted, Ted, I can’t believe you’re alright!”

“Well, I wasn’t going to leave you alone, was I?” Ted said as he wrapped his arms around his shoulders, short of breath.

Booster put him back on his feet and took Ted’s hands in his. “I wasn’t alone,” he said.

“It’s my turn now,” Guy said, shoving Booster aside and pulling Ted into a crushing hug, burying his face in the crook of his neck. “I missed you, Teddy. Don’t die on us again, ok?”

“I’ll try not to,” Ted laughed. “It’s good to be back.”

Guy pulled out and ran his fingers through Ted’s hair, getting some of the dirt off. “It’s good to have you back.”

Kyle was looking at them with a fond look on his face, and Booster took his hand. “Ted, this is Kyle,” he said. “Kyle, Ted.”

Ted looked at their hands, and saw the thread coming from his own finger linked to Kyle’s, to Booster’s, to Guy’s.

“Oh,” Ted said. He offered Kyle his hand. “Nice to meet you.”

Kyle shook it warmly. “Nice to meet you too. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

Ted looked at the threads again, and at Guy’s hand against Booster’s hip. “Looks like I have a lot of catching up to do.”

* * *

 They all moved back to Oa, after throwing a party to celebrate Ted’s return among the living. Ted started working with Booster in maintaining the time stream intact, and Guy and Kyle were back on their usual Lantern duty. They spent their downtime all four of them together, taking care of the bar.

It didn’t take long for Kyle to fall for Ted, like Booster and Guy before him.

And Ted, well, he always did have a thing for Booster. And the situation allowed him to let his feelings from Guy develop from a simple crush to durable love. And Kyle’s charm was as devastatingly effective on him as it has been on the others.

Yes, they were soulmates. What Kyle drew on himself showed up on their skin. Guy felt their pain as his own. Ted’s finger was linked to theirs. And they visited Booster in his dreams —which they remembered now that they all found each other. But it was far from the only thing tying them together. They loved each other deeply, and even if they didn't have all of these clues, these bonds between them, they would have still found each other. It probably would have taken them longer, but it would still be the four of them, eventually.

It wasn't very usual, and it wasn't anything either of them expected to, but they made it work. They loved each other too much to do anything but make it work.

The only bothering thing was that now, they needed an even bigger bed.


End file.
